I have never bought a Christmas Tree in all my live long days. Not a one. My parents always have one, and I have spent all but one of my previous 41 Christmases with them. But I have never felt the need to have one in any of my various flats and houses since leaving home. There is something of the Scrooge about me and Christmas is an annoyance. Plus it seems a shame to kill a tree just to hang some tinsel on it. But it's mainly meanness, mean-spiritedness and laziness that has led to this decision.
And is it bad for the environment to kill all these trees? Because presumably without this crazy tradition then millions of Christmas trees would never be grown. And the trees are always replaced with new trees for next year. So perhaps the whole Christmas tree phenomenon is actually saving the environment, even if millions of trees are being mown down in the process like benign and harmless triffids. Though they can give you a nasty scratch with their pines!
Anyway, that possible positive environmental impact has only just occurred to me and is therefore no excuse for me buying my first ever Christmas tree. I headed down to Chiswick where some men outside Sainsbury's have got quite a production line going. I quickly selected a small tree - costing twenty pounds, which is, it seems, cheap for a dead tree - and the men ran it through a little machine that looked like a cement mixer, but in fact just covered it in a mesh for ease of transportation. And that was that.
It came stuck into a little circle of wood, so that it could be displayed sans bucket. But on getting it back I realised that it was not only took up much less space than I imagined - it's tiny - but it's also at quite an amusing and jaunty angle. I quite like it for its imperfections though. A bent Christmas tree is ideal for a man with such a bent attitude towards the whole festival.
We decorated the tree quite quickly, due to its tininess. I haven't done this for over twenty years either and I have to admit that despite my grumpiness it was a lot of fun. I had considered buying some chocolate decorations, but had correctly decided that I would just eat them all straight away. Somehow, as a kid, the chocolate on the tree seemed almost sacred and stealing it without permission was a massive crime. I'd always ask "Can I have a chocolate off the tree?" and be told I couldn't and yet would accept this! I am not sure I ever dared to take one without a go-ahead from a parent before I was in my twenties, when I used to steal them in front of my incredulous nephews and nieces and then hide the foil down the side of the sofa. They used to love my naughtiness. But were similarly in awe of the Christmas Tree chocolates to never attempt such a thing themselves. Maybe it's just cos it's around present giving time and kids don't want to risk pissing anyone off and losing their presents.
Ooooh and writing about this has just reminded me that there were some decorations, years ago (maybe still, but I haven't seem them for decades) that had a fondant filling, a bit like a Cadbury's Creme egg without the yellow bit (and years before that treat was invented). I loved those fondant ones. They were the best! I've had a little Proustian moment there.
Even without chocolates (as it would have been quite quickly even if I had bought chocolates) my little wonky tree looks lovely and the smell is even more evocative of things past. Alas it will be lonely this Christmas as I'll be in Grenada on the big day itself. Unless I take it in my hand luggage and stick it up on the beach.
Given that I'll be escaping Christmas I suppose it's good to have something to celebrate it now. And what better way to celebrate the birth of Jesus than by killing a tree. After all he was nailed up on a tree in the end, so it's only fitting that we get our own back on the trees for their part in his demise.
I am not sure that it was a Christmas tree that they nailed him to, but as long as a tree dies then I don't care.
As I drove my tree home I heard an item on the Chris Evans show about a man who hires out living Christmas trees each year, which he then takes back and keeps alive for use the next year. I guess it was
this guy. Well what use is that? We can only truly celebrate the birth of the baby Jesus by killing things unnecessarily. Next thing you know someone will start hiring out live turkeys, which you'll just have to lick and then give back.
